When looking back at the history of computing in the UK, you can’t help but notice an early admiration for the British inventor, Sir Clive Sinclair. Awarded a knighthood in 1983 and affectionately dubbed Uncle Clive both before and after, he became well known for having a brain that bubbled with brilliant ideas. Sure, his business acumen didn’t always keep pace with such thoughts, but that simply made him all the more endearing.
“I am not a businessman by nature,” he once told the Independent on Sunday, preferring to see himself as an ideas person capable of creating products. Yet it was those products – regardless of whether they were hits or misses – that had a major impact on the technology markets. In that sense, it matters little that most of his companies faced financial difficulties, because there’s no doubting the impressive legacy Sir Clive left behind when he passed away in 2021.
Sinclair began to leave his mark at an early age. After becoming editorial assistant on Practical Wireless magazine aged 17, he set up Sinclair Radionics in 1961 when he was 22. He also had a strong belief in making things small, both in size and price. His standout products included the world’s smallest radio (Micromatic), the world’s first portable TV (Microvision) and the world’s first slimline pocket calculator (Sinclair Executive). Radionics was, without doubt, an innovative firm.
Here, though, we’re looking at another of Sinclair’s companies: Sinclair Research, a firm that came into play on the back of costly failures at Radionics. Among them was the Black Watch
